Beyond Reality
by Schloss
Summary: Harry has to deal with his depression following his late mentor's murder, as well as deal with deeply bottled emotions toward the death of his only godfather. In canon with Books 1-5, AU. WIP, H/G, R/H Later Chapters
1. Prologue

_**A/N: This is an AU that take place after Book 6, which make both Sirius AND Dumbledore not present in this story. **_

Prologue

It was a colder summer day than typically normal, on a street which thrived in normality. Its inhabitants none the wiser to the fog that continuously draped itself across every one of its identical properties. The houses being ignorant of such abnormality could be compared to all of the everyday normal citizens that lived at Number 4, Privet drive.

All but one.

Harry Potter lay on his small and rusty bed, eyes locked on the perfectly white ceiling, staring unseeingly at the nothingness that had overtaken a normal teenager's summer holiday. But Harry Potter was anything but normal. He knew that the fog that wrapped and wound itself through the suburb of Little Whinging, was not an occurrence of an unexpected and unprecedented cold front as the weatherman kept telling him, in fact it was the perfect and soul bitingly cold weather of a thousand loose dementors scaling the earths atmosphere, waiting for word from their master.

Harry Potter knew that everyone of the deaths that were blamed on an unknown virus reported in the daily news, were actually result to the most final and vile of curses ever used in the history of wizard kind, Avada Kedavra. He knew that the entire existence of wizard-kind now rested on his shoulders. He knew that the crazed lunatic, Voldemort, or to us lesser, afraid beings, he-who-must-not-be-named, must be stopped.

And one thing he knew more than anyone else, was that to keep anyone safe, was to keep them away from him. He knew this because of the repetitive fate that seemed to befall everyone of his loved ones. He knew this but he didn't have to like it.

Harry had been in that position for a week, only rising to take a small sip of water from the taps in the bathroom after he had made use of the amenities, before lying down on the bed again, with his smallest Weasley jumper as a pillow. It was the only thing that kept away the nightmares, when his lifeless eyes did eventually close to a fitful slumber.

As the next dull day wound down into night, across town in a misshapen and toppling house, Ginny Weasley lay in much the same position as Harry. Close to a stage of unconsciousness, her mind was reeling and replaying, the last day of school before the start of summer. Harry had broken up with her, his face hard and his eyes cast downward, because she knew that if they made eye contact, they'd both know the truth.

In that simple state of almost dreamland, Ginny liked to think what Harry might be doing at that moment, whether he might be thinking of her or about some of the timeless moments they had shared in their relationship the previous school year. Little did she know that he was in fact pondering the worst possible outlook on life ever,

Kill or be killed.

Ron had spent the previous week watching his sister waste away. He knew what had happened on the last day of term, Harry had told him that day what he would be doing, and at that time he agreed with it wholeheartedly. But at the moment, whilst watching the normally sparkling fire behind his youngest siblings eyes fade away he had reservations about everyone of his big brother beliefs. If this is what he'd have to watch until Voldemort died, Voldemort had better die quickly, because if someone didn't help his sister soon she'd waste away to nothing. But unfortunately, the one person who could help Ginny was unavailable, and as many in the Weasley family knew, probably in a worse state than Ginny.

And this left Harry with another thing he loved dearly resting on his already weighted shoulders.


	2. Chapter 1

Luckily for Harry, or luckily for the wizarding world, depending on how you looked at it, Arthur Weasley pressed the shiny button that rang the bell at number 4 Privet Drive, one month into the three month vacation from Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry.

He found Harry much in the same position as he'd left his daughter, curled up in the foetal position on a bed that seemed to be growing much too big. Harry's eyes dimly registered the presence of the only father he'd ever really known.

Mr Weasley sat on the edge of the bed and looked at Harry, who was thinned and frail after a month of nearly not eating at all.

"You ready to come home, son?"

Harry's eyes, unfocused as they may have been, slid slowly to Mr Weasley and shed the first tears that he'd shed all summer. They slid shining and real down each of his hollowed cheeks and dripped unceremoniously onto the stained and worn duvet that had been Dudley's, when he was three.

Mr Weasley pulled Harry into an embrace that only a father could have given a son and held Harry as a lifetime of grief poured itself out of the mature 16 year olds heart and body.

Harry shakily wiped the remaining tears from his stained cheeks as he sat up for the first time that day.

"Home?" he asked in a voice scratched and raw, daring to believe that Mr Weasley meant what he'd said.

"The blood wards are ineffective, Dumbledore's not here to keep them sustained. Even though it is your mother's love that saves you from Voldemort, it was Dumbledore's magic that kept that love strong. At the moment we're lucky that Voldemort hasn't noticed the wards becoming weaker by the day."

Harry's eyes which had been hopeful were downcast after the painful reminder of his inspiring Headmaster's demise.

"Harry it wasn't your fault, it was nobody's fault except Voldemort's." Arthur tried to assure, his hand reaching out to put a hand on Harry's shoulder.

"My daughter needs you Harry," he murmured, his own expression becoming pained. "I don't understand what happened between the two of you, but from what I have picked up on, Harry, you being with my daughter, although hard for me as a father to feel right about...you two are so young...but you being with her, it does nothing to her safety. Voldemort marked her when she was 11, there's nothing at 16 that will affect her or my entire family's safety. We were in this from the beginning, and Harry you seem to be the only one who she needs at the moment. She needs you, and I may have 6 other sons, Harry, that care about their sister, but only you can give her what she needs to get through this war. And Harry, this war, it could kill her body, but not being with you, it's-it's killing her soul."

Harry stood up, his legs shaking from grief, disuse and pure emotion as he picked up the few clothes on the floor and Ginny's Weasley jumper, not even blushing a bit as he picked it up and put it caringly in his trunk.

Picking up his wand from the bedside table, Harry slid it in his back pocket before nodding to Mr Weasley, who after sighing and vanishing Harry's trunk ahead of them, pulled Harry to him in supporting embrace and side-along apparated them both to the front porch of the burrow.

"Welcome Home"

Molly Weasley was waiting for her husband to bring her seventh son home, after a much too long time away. She was expecting a very subdued and worn looking Harry to come through the squeaky back door of her home, what she was not expecting was a man, not much unlike Sirius Black after escaping Azkaban, growth on his face and his face gaunt, to be led into her kitchen under the arm of a worn out Arthur Weasley. She had to suppress a gasp the boy she remembered, clearly grown up in ways that the simple mind could not comprehend sunk gratefully into a chair at her kitchen table.

Pulling the charm-warmed plate she'd kept especially for him after dinner that night, off the bench and a glass of pumpkin juice, both of which she put in front of Harry before wrapping his bony frame in a motherly hug, and sat down at the table a little ways away from him to supervise his picking at the food, which she knew he didn't feel like eating.

After eating as best he could, Harry stiffly got up and made to clean his place which Mrs Weasley would have none of.

"You just go on upstairs, Harry. Leave this to me." Harry's eyes shifted to hers before this time wrapping his arms around her rounded frame, resting his head on her shoulder.

"Thanks, Mum" he said quietly.

"You're always welcome, Harry. No you go on up and get some sleep, we've set up Charlies room for you this time." She said after returning Harry's unpredictable hug. And watched him retreat slowly up the stairs to where a comfortable bed in Charlie's old room awaited him.

"What did they do to him, Arthur?" Molly asked a while later, while getting ready to turn in for the night, her shock bubbling to the surface from when Harry had come to the burrow.

Arthur merely rubbed a tired hand down his face.

"Not what did they do to him, but what did his own mind, do to him." he said warily. "He was in the same position a Ginny, Molly, except I don't think he's been eating at _all_. And when I mentioned Dumbledore... Molly he blames himself for his death. Not to mention we know he feels the same about Cedric and Sirius."

"He's only 16, Arthur, 16! And yet, he looks as haggard as a fully grown man, I hardly recognised him as he stumbled in that door. Merlin knows what he's going to be like when he reads the papers."

"What he needs for now is a loving family and a more than a few square meals."

"The family we can give him more than three times over and the meals aren't a problem, its getting him to eat them that will be."

"I don't think that that will particularly be our problem rather than our daughters." He said with a small chuckle ", besides, now that he's home, I think we'll be seeing more than just Ron at the dinner table."

Molly smiled, sharing her husbands views on the one good thing that should arise in the coming months, her face became stern as she spoke her last words before falling into a distracted slumber,

"I hope your right Arthur, because I'll be damned if I let that cowardly snake try and take away my daughter as well as my brothers, we haven't come this far to have it all taken away again, Dumbledore's death will not be in vain."

Harry awoke sometime that night to an unknown sound coming from somewhere down the hall. He was surprised that what he now had to strain to hear had awoken him. But as the noises became clearer as the last traces of slumber were erased from his foggy mind, Harry knew exactly why he'd awoken.

Ginny

Moving faster than he had in months, and as fast as he would dare without awakening the rest of the household he quietly made his way two doors down to the closed door of the person who'd been on his mind all summer.

Casting a quick _alohamora_ he slipped quietly into the room, noticing the dust that covered the better half of it, the lightly coloured, faded pink walls, and the dresser on which a photo of them both sat framed, facing the bed. Harry didn't even realise that photo had been taken, and tears sprang unwillingly to his eyes as he realised the similarity between that, and one he had in his trunk of both his mother and father when they were his and Ginny's age.

Harry had been giving Ginny a piggyback around the lake, and her head had been resting on his shoulder, her legs wrapped around his waist and her arms draped around his shoulders. The photo-Harry turned his head to face Ginny, trying to ask a question, but was cut off as a smiling Ginny leaned further around and touched her lips gently to his before placing her head back down on his shoulder.

Harry's reminiscing was cut short as a quite strangled sob broke through his day dream and he turned to find Ginny on the bed.

At least he had to assume it was Ginny.

The person on the bed looked not much older than a second year, curled up in a self-protected ball, under the covers which as much were keeping her warm, were probably stifling in the nightmarish visions that were obviously attacking Ginny's mind.

Without hesitation Harry strode to the bed, sitting on the edge of it and ran a hand gently through Ginny's once shiny hair, and brushed his thumb gently across her own hollowed cheek. Her murmuring stopped and her head which had been shaking stopped as her body responded to Harry's ministrations.

Harry lay down next to her and pulled her back to his chest. And after a minute, Ginny's entire body stopped shivering and shaking, relaxing almost and uncurled from its previous position, allowing for the first time in a month, another person to protect her. Even in sleep Ginny moved to the warmth that was Harry, and her head snuggled tightly beneath the space of his chin, as Harry's legs moved to press against hers offering her as much comfort as he dared while she slept.

"I'm sorry, Ginny" his voice cracked as he inhaled deeply the smell that had nearly disappeared from the small Weasley jumper he kept in his trunk.

"I'm so, so, sorry" he whispered before falling into a dreamless sleep, that was deeper than he'd been in for the entire summer.

He was finally home.

When Ginny opened her eyes the next day, the sun was shining against her window and the net curtains were doing nothing to keep the strong beam of light from penetrating her closed eyelids. This surprised Ginny, as her bedroom faced the west side of the house, meaning it had to be close to 2 or 3 in the afternoon. What surprised her more; however, was the delicious warmth radiating around her, and the fact that she felt well rested for the first time in a month. Her mothers cooking was wafting up the stairs and she decided that she'd better go down and make an appearance for the day, before she collapsed back into her bed just has she had been doing every other morning.

However as she removed the comforter from around her midsection and tried to sit up, a heavy weight around her middle kept her from going anywhere. She then for the first time noticed the smell of polished wood, quite like a broomstick and an earthy undercurrent intermingling with the roast her mother was cooking downstairs.

Daring to believe what she was dreaming, she looked down to find Harry's arm wrapped firmly around her middle, pulling gently towards him, in an overprotective gesture.

She slowly pivoted in his embrace and stared at his face, a small relieved smile coming to her face, as she fully realised that Harry, _her_ Harry was back, and sleeping beside her.

Her eyes followed every line in his face as she watched him sleep and she noticed every change that had occurred since she last saw him on the Hogwarts express.

His hair was a little longer, he had dark circles framing his closed eyes, his skin was stretched across his more prominent cheekbones and the lower half of his face was covered in a dark dusting of new bristles, which Ginny had never before seen on Harry's face, but at the same time, she'd never really appreciated how striking he could look with the slight shadow on his chin, even with his gaunt, hollowed look. Her gaze flitted back up Harry's face, searching each new frown line and she had to stifle a gasp as her own brown eyes met with Harry's emerald green.

For a long time neither of them said anything, Harry just stared into Ginny's eyes, willing her to hear the words he'd whispered last night. He gathered her to him gently, pressing his nose to her hair deliberately breathing deeply. Ginny let out a small sigh as she too made sure to savour this moment.

Almost regretfully Harry made his way out of Ginny's arms, giving her a small comforting smile before turning and making his way out of her room, stopping only to pick up and dust the picture on her drawers, before making his way down to breakfast.

All this was done without a word, yet Ginny knew, deep down, that these few simple moments she'd just shared with Harry, meant that there was hope. And hope in a world filled with anguish was a rare and beautiful thing indeed.

An hour later, after being told to clean up rather than help cook the roast, Harry re-emerged in the Weasley's kitchen to find Ginny helping her mother for the first time in a month, darting here and there, weaving seamlessly around her mother, as if the two of them were made as a machine.

Every now and again, Molly Weasley would pause and watch her nearly 16 year old daughter do a mundane task such as fill a pot with water, or clean away the peelings from the potato's which were peeling themselves. With a small smile she'd then go back to whipping the filling of her famous Treacle tart, thanking Merlin for one, Harry James Potter.

Harry, who had for the most part been watching these small interactions was now clean shaven and his hair was once again at its usual length, although no matter how much he'd tried to comb it, it still kept its signature windswept, messy appearance.

"Ginny dear, why don't you go and see how Harry's doing, he may have a little trouble finding the necessary tools for him to get properly cleaned up." Molly suggested, having no idea that the person in question was leaning softly against the doorframe behind her. "Your dad's blade is in the left hand drawer at the bottom, and my scissors are in the top of my basket in the sitting room, mind you put them back though."

Ginny put the last of the scraps in the bin to go to the chickens before wiping her hands slowly on a dishcloth, her too unaware that Harry was there and listening to everything they were saying.

She gasped as she turned around however, as she found him with a pair of jeans and a polo that was slightly to small for Harry's liking, his hair mussed, yet at the same length as was normal, and his strong jaw line was smooth, without a trace of first time accidents like all her brothers before her had managed to acquire.

The dark circles under her eyes did nothing to prevent her eyes from shining as she realised he'd even cut the back of his hair, to perfection in her mind.

"How did you manage to _do_ that Harry?" she asked, clearly wondering how an imitation of Sirius could go to so seriously good-looking in just an hour.

"Do what?"

"Get your hair to look perfectly normal, and shave for the first time without so much as a red blotch!!!!"

"Shave?" Harry questioned looking at her as if she were crazy.

By now Mrs Weasley had turned around and inspected her seventh son, clearly perplexed just as her daughter.

Ginny waked to Harry and gently traced her fingertips over his cheek and chin, giving him an extremely helpful but antagonising hint as to what she was talking about.

"Uhhhh, I just sort of look in the mirror... and think about what it should be like, and the next second, it's just done."

"Harry, that's wandless _and_ wordless magic!"

"Harry, dear" Molly interrupted clearly thinking of something she'd never once thought of in the past 6 years, "Have you ever had a haircut?"

Because not once as she'd cut the boys and Ginny's hair over the summer had she cut Harry's and yet his hair always seemed to be the length he desired.

"Yeh..." He paused and grimaced as if re-living something dreadful, "Once when I was 6, Aunt Petunia shaved all my hair off, but in the morning it was like it was before she cut it. I remember going to sleep thinking how much I wanted to look normal, and then in the morning, I was,"

"I suppose since then I've just always maintained it myself, and then in 5th Year I started with my face..."

"So you've always kept your hair trimmed, with a single thought, since you were six!?!?" Ginny asked incredulously.

Harry just smiled at her and nodded before heading to the drawers to pull out the cutlery.


End file.
